“One person’s suffering is our collected suffering:” Interview with Tokata Iron Eyes
The original interviews I did for Youth to Power were longer than could fit in my book, but I wanted to share the valuable information with you all. These interviews will be up online as a permanent, free resource for people, young people in particular, looking for inspiration.
— Jamie Margolin
Tokata Iron Eyes (she/her), 16, is an activist with the #NODakotaAccessPipeline Standing Rock movement.
Jamie Margolin: Tell me about your story and what your activism journey has been like!
Tokata; I got started with activism when I was nine; it was the first time I ever spoke in public. Before that, activism was really just about being raised within my indigenous culture and being taught outside the Western education system about what was important. Recognizing nature and my relationship and responsibility to it. And it was inherent when I was little that other people didn’t think the same.
When I was growing up, I was in a mostly White and conservative community and I was always one of the only brown kids in the spaces I was in, trying to advocate. But I’ve always had my family and my culture as an outlet to let some of that energy be released and put to good use.
Around [age nine], I realized I just had to say something. I didn’t see anyone else who was as young as me and looked like me, so my mom helped me pick myself up and assert myself in the space around me. A lot of times if you’re a woman of color in board meetings with people who are older than you, mostly White, and hostile environments of people who have been stuck in the same cycle, and you’re there as a young person trying to reach out, they’re not getting it. We as indigenous youth feel unwelcomed being able to assert our position and take up space.
Then in 2016, I was twelve, and before that I’d been public speaking but it was just my parents taking me to board meetings where people were talking about plans for extractive fossil fuel sites that were disrupting indigenous sacred sites. That [was] how I got started: in 2016, the Dakota Access Pipeline. When I was twelve, I found out that it was going to be built right next to my community in my reservation! That was when things REALLY kicked off. I knew I needed to take serious action.
These unplanned things happen in your life and I was disrupted from being a kid, having to fight this pipeline. As a person with the resources where I lived to feel unafraid to do that, it was not a choice on whether or not to fight the pipeline. I lived in Standing Rock, North Dakota, an indigenous reservation. There, privilege is having a roof over your head, two parents, and never being scared. I was lucky enough to have that, so it really made me think about the other kids in my communities who also cared but didn’t have the resources I had to speak up.
It was this calling; I knew what had to happen so someday I wouldn’t be the only kid speaking. Ever since I was small, it’s always been [about] using my voice to empower other indigenous youth and trying to spread awareness about the things that we believe in.
The movement against DAPL was my first interaction with what activism could look like. Activism meant community, it meant nonviolence, it meant peace and embracing my culture. By being the change we want to see and treating each other the way we want to be. That was the first time I’d ever been the reality of that.
The physical encampments where indigenous folks camped out to stop the Dakota Access Oil Pipeline from being built on our land were up for about eighteen months. The pipeline was being built [on] treaty land [using treaties] that were not honored since they were signed. This land was treaty land, so we decided to occupy the land as a physical sign of resistance against the fossil fuel industry and the pipeline. There we stayed, blocking the construction and harnessing this indigenous system and way of life and values. [We] encompassed what this world could look like if we really looked at each other in a way that was humane and compassionate. We hosted nonviolent direct actions almost every day. It was an occupation in prayer and ceremony. As indigenous people, we cannot resist without inherently bringing in other factors like our land and our way of life. When we fight for one, we fight for both.
How do you stay true to your cause and keep your organizing spaces free of competition and ego?
Transparency is huge within movements. When you’re talking about changing something so huge and momentous, a lot of times, when we start to get notoriety for those things, we lose our intention. Being transparent with one another is so important. If you have transparency, you as an organization can grow and prosper together. But if there’s this competition over who gets what, we lose sight over the main goal at hand. And we see in every movement in history, it’s this lack of transparency and hint of jealousy and competition that digs apart what’s truly important to us. Being able to really connect with each other and [the] cause. It’s a personal choice. You have to be really conscious about how you live. If you put up false personas to the people you work with in this time of uncertainty, then you give false signals to those who trust you. So be conscious of your words and what they mean to other people.
A lot of times [transparency is] forgotten in movements where we’re accustomed to always being around people who are already leaders and think like us. But reach into the masses of the majority of the population and reach out to those who are indifferent and access them and the things that make them want to create change. That’s where the importance and connection and action comes from. When we’re surrounded by people who always think the same as [we do], we forget we’re fighting for those who don’t. Recognize that there are already thousands of people doing the same work you’re doing, but in their communities, who don’t have access to such opportunities [as] you have, so to be able to uplift their voices is really valuable. We need to create solutions that are diverse and accessible for everyone.
What are some practices that the rest of the activist movement could learn from indigenous organizers?’
One thing especially if we’re talking about environmental activism is we’ve recognized humans as [the] holy and superior and unbeatable species, I think that the most important thing that we can do is unlearn those practices and relearn this inherent connection to nature I have. I grew up knowing that nature was my relative and everything in it was a part of me. When you make these issues personal to yourself, it’s a lot easier to stay grounded in what [you’re] fighting for. People only fight for something when they feel it affects them, but if you learn from indigenous folks about how we are all connected with nature and each other, one person’s suffering is our collected suffering. It’s not the earth suffering; it’s all of our suffering because we are so interconnected with each other.
